Chico Women's Club to have 1911 piano ready for Silent Film Festival

A 1911 Steinway Concert Grand Piano is shown in the shop of Erwin Piano Restoration in Modesto during work being done to ready it for the Chico Silent Film Festival at Chico Women's Club. (Courtesy of Dale Erwin)

CHICO -- It sat on stage at Chico Women's Club for decades, the top warped, its ivory keys chipped and yellowing, and its grand sound fading. Then club President Glynda-Lee Hoffmann realized the state of the Steinway Concert Grand Piano was something the group celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2013 would make right again.

"This was a 1911 piano. We knew it had value if we could get it restored," Hoffmann said Feb. 28, while she awaited word on the restoration's progress.

The piano, a project taken on by Dale Erwin of Erwin Piano Restoration in Modesto, will be restored and returned to the stage at the clubhouse, 592 E. Third St., by noon Friday. It will be tuned and ready for the Silent Film Festival that starts at 5 p.m. and continues Saturday, 10:30 a.m. to the last movie at 9 p.m.

Its inaugural performance will be christened by renown pianist Frederick Hodges, who returns for Chico's second silent film festival, along with film restorer and cinema instructor David Shepard.

$40,000 restoration

Bringing the Steinway Concert Grand "Model B" back to its original glory will cost Chico Women's Club about $40,000, said Hoffmann.

Although the idea of raising the money seemed daunting, a series of events that put the restorer in Chico on the right day to pick up the piano, the gift of another piano that will reduce the final bill, and a bequest from the late Hester Patrick, all seemed to put the plan on track.

"We had a little money here and there," Hoffmann said. "We had $11,400 from Hester Patrick."

The late matriarch of the Patrick Ranch had been a club member for years before she died in 2001. Hoffmann learned another member, the late Oreon Barceloux, had noted in her will her own 1915 Steinway Grand Piano would go to the club.

The day the restorer arrived to pick up the piano, he was able to take a look at Barceloux's piano at the closing of her estate, determined it was in worse shape but fixable and offered to take $5,000 off the bill for it in trade.

Both large instruments were disassembled, loaded into Erwin's truck and headed to Modesto.

Erwin reported the club's piano needed some new keys, a rebuilt leg and a new top — one was found in time after someone ordered two for another restoration.

Events happened quickly after club members spent months deciding whether the expense of restoration was worth it.

"We thought about it for four or five months," said Hoffmann. "Then I woke up in the middle of the night and thought, this is an investment in our community. We just have to get creative."

That will involve a year of fundraising with the newly restored piano at the center of "Ebony & Ivory" events.

"Ebony & Ivory" events

An Ebony & Ivory Musical Series will be presented April 19, May 17, June 21, July 19 and Aug. 16 with differing themes, wine, hors d'oeuvres and dancing; a progressive dinner Sept. 27 and a culminating 100th anniversary celebration Sept. 8.

In addition, the club's piano will be available when community events are held at the women's club.

There are plans to continue progressive dinners in the future. "We hope to produce this event every year until we pay off this piano," Hoffmann said. "This is the biggest expenditure Chico Women's Club has ever done," she said of the club that was begun in 1913 with 34 charter members, including Chico founder Annie Bidwell.

Second annual Chico Silent Film Festival

All films will be at Chico Women's Club, 592 E. Third St. Tickets at Avenue 9 Gallery, 879-1821. $10 pre-sale per film; $12 "Leave 'em Laughing" comedy block; $2 children 12 and under; $12 at door, per film, or $49 for all-festival pass.

10 a.m. — Champagne brunch with 40 tickets available. For $100, guests will have brunch, see a private screening of Charlie Chaplin's "The Immigrant" with accompaniment by Frederick Hodges on the restored grand, a review by Shepard, and an all-festival pass. Dale Erwin will be there to talk about the piano's repairs.

Noon — "Leave 'em Laughing"

2 p.m. — "Passing Fancy," 1933

4 p.m.— "Keno Batets, Liar," 1915 and "The Whistle," 1921, both with William S. Hart